Net neutrality goes back to court —

21 states sue FCC to restore net neutrality rules

A long legal process starts now.

Enlarge/ FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn addresses protesters outside the Federal Communication Commission building to rally against the end of net neutrality rules on December 14, 2017 in Washington, DC.

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Twenty-one states and the District of Columbia today kicked off a lawsuit to overturn the Federal Communications Commission's repeal of net neutrality rules. Advocacy groups are also suing the FCC.

The states suing the FCC are New York, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mississippi, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, and Washington. That's every US state with a Democratic attorney general. Republican state attorneys general did not join the petition.

Further Reading

"The petition is the first step by states to attempt to block the FCC's decision, and it will allow the attorneys general to move forward with the appeal in the future," said an announcement from Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson.

The FCC voted on December 14 to deregulate the broadband industry, remove net neutrality rules, and to prevent states from issuing their own, similar rules. The rules prohibited ISPs from blocking and throttling Internet traffic and from prioritizing traffic in exchange for payment.

"Allowing powerful special interests to act as the Internet's gatekeepers harms consumers, innovation, and small businesses," Ferguson said. "We believe the FCC acted unlawfully when it gutted net neutrality, and I look forward to holding the FCC accountable to the rule of law." The suit is being led by New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman.

“Protective petition”

The states filed a "protective petition for review," which essentially reserves them a spot in court challenges against the FCC. The petition was filed in the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

There is a 10-day window for filing lawsuits, but it's not always clear whether the deadline applies to the 10 business days after the FCC publishes an order on its website or to the 10 days after the order is published in the Federal Register. The FCC released the final version of its net neutrality repeal order on January 4, but it hasn't yet been published in the Federal Register.

Further Reading

The 21 states and Washington, DC, will likely file another petition for review after the Federal Register publication, but the one today ensures that they will be involved in the lawsuit. If petitions are filed in multiple appeals courts, there would be a lottery to determine where the case will be heard. Previous cases on FCC net neutrality rules have been decided in the District of Columbia Circuit.

Today's petition doesn't outline the states' full arguments but says the repeal "is arbitrary, capricious, and an abuse of discretion within the meaning of the Administrative Procedure Act; violates federal law, including, but not limited to, the Constitution, the Communications Act of 1934, as amended, and FCC regulations promulgated thereunder; conflicts with the notice-and‐comment rulemaking requirements of 5 U.S.C. § 553; and is otherwise contrary to law."

Advocacy groups Public Knowledge and New America's Open Technology Institute also filed similar protective petitions today.

The case could easily take at least a year to be decided. FCC net neutrality rules enacted in February 2015 were upheld in appeals court in June 2016. Before that, rules enacted in December 2010 were struck down in January 2014.

118 Reader Comments

Good to see those attorneys general doing their job. While this was entirely expected, it still needed to be done. If nothing else, it could tie up the Restoring Internet Freedom order for a good year or two while a new Congress is seated (if the current one doesn't strike down the rule change).

Maybe after all of this, we might finally get some actual legislation regarding the Internet (that doesn't solely benefit ISPs). I know, I've got to lay off the meds...

Good to see those attorneys general doing their job. While this was entirely expected, it still needed to be done. If nothing else, it could tie up the Restoring Internet Freedom order for a good year or two while a new Congress is seated (if the current one doesn't strike down the rule change).

Maybe after all of this, we might finally get some actual legislation regarding the Internet (that doesn't solely benefit ISPs). I know, I've got to lay off the meds...

Based on the letters I've received from John Cornyn, Ted Cruz, and Greg Abbott, I can say definitively that not only will Texas never join this list, but that the state might actually sue to repeal if NN is reinstated. Apparently Net Neutrality is basically communism, and it's responsible for reducing companies like Comcast to begging on the street.

Why on earth has this become a partisan issue in government??? And now that we're in an election year, the Democratic politicians seem bent on leveraging it as a partisan issue.

Most Americans across party lines support NN. One party (mostly) does support NN, and one party (mostly) doesn't. How exactly is it the Democrats doing the will of the people that is making it partisan?

Nothing prevented Republicans from filing suit just like nothing prevented them from not confirming Pai in the first place or voting in favor of the CRA to clean up their mess.

Now I agree it 'shouldn't' be a partisan issue. Every member of Congress should be in favor of the CRA and every AG filing suit here but it takes two to tango. It isn't Democrats making this a partisan issue.

Based on the letters I've received from John Cornyn, Ted Cruz, and Greg Abbott, I can say definitively that not only will Texas never join this list, but that the state might actually sue to repeal if NN is reinstated. Apparently Net Neutrality is basically communism, and it's responsible for reducing companies like Comcast to begging on the street.

Why on earth has this become a partisan issue in government??? And now that we're in an election year, the Democratic politicians seem bent on leveraging it as a partisan issue.

Because the GOP base's motivations have been basically "sweet liberal tears" since the rise of Limbaugh and Fox News. Add that to first-past-the-post and partisan gerrymandering...

Basic ignorance of technology and current events plays a large part as well.

IDK how many times I have heard "The internet wasn't broken before the government 'fixed' it with Net Neutrality, so why do we need Net Neutrality". These people don't understand the technology or history of the internet or the events that moved Net Neutrality into the spotlight a few years ago.

Most of these people are older people. Older people are more likely to be on the right, therefore the politics of anti-net neutrality tend to the right.

Based on the letters I've received from John Cornyn, Ted Cruz, and Greg Abbott, I can say definitively that not only will Texas never join this list, but that the state might actually sue to repeal if NN is reinstated. Apparently Net Neutrality is basically communism, and it's responsible for reducing companies like Comcast to begging on the street.

What did Marsha Blackburn have to say about this? Did she take time off from kicking puppies and babies to answer you?

Based on the letters I've received from John Cornyn, Ted Cruz, and Greg Abbott, I can say definitively that not only will Texas never join this list, but that the state might actually sue to repeal if NN is reinstated. Apparently Net Neutrality is basically communism, and it's responsible for reducing companies like Comcast to begging on the street.

Hey Comcast CEO can only afford 1 Private Plan trip per day OK?This is a horrific act of liberal communism at play.

How can he possibly survive with only 1 private a flight a day? And only $10,000 a day on food expenses? This has to be against the Geneva convention.

The 1% are an endangered species and Net Neutrality is only promoting the extinction of this protected class! Can you say with a straight face you would rather protect an endangered animal than an endangered class of humans?

Can you good Sir?

Stop the Extinction of the Ulta Rich Today!Promote Tax cuts for the rich and Net Neutrality repeal!

Don't forget the most famous saying,Sacrifice the many for the happiness of the few.

Why on earth has this become a partisan issue in government??? And now that we're in an election year, the Democratic politicians seem bent on leveraging it as a partisan issue.

Sure it shouldn't be a partisan issue but the reality is that the leaders of the two political parties greatly differ on this. - The leaders of the Republicans, want to dismantle net neutrality. - The leaders of the Democrats are in favor of net neutrality. That is a basic fact.

In a democracy the voters will have a choice in November between electing those from the party that is against net neutrality or the party that supports it.

Why on earth has this become a partisan issue in government??? And now that we're in an election year, the Democratic politicians seem bent on leveraging it as a partisan issue.

Because the GOP base's motivations have been basically "sweet liberal tears" since the rise of Limbaugh and Fox News. Add that to first-past-the-post and partisan gerrymandering...

Basic ignorance of technology and current events plays a large part as well.

IDK how many times I have heard "The internet wasn't broken before the government 'fixed' it with Net Neutrality, so why do we need Net Neutrality". These people don't understand the technology or history of the internet or the events that moved Net Neutrality into the spotlight a few years ago.

Most of these people are older people. Older people are more likely to be on the right, therefore the politics of anti-net neutrality tend to the right.

It's a complicated issue with a lot of moving parts. The majority of people talking about it on this site have been following this issue for years, are generally well informed, and don't need to revisit the entire history of Net Neutrality every time the argument comes up.

The majority of the people I've seen defending the Pai order (and yes, they exist) don't understand what Net Neutrality is. They see it as people complaining that their Netflix didn't load quickly (because that is the basic argument starting point for most of us).

They don't see the history of Comcast and Verizon putting Netflix over a barrel for money because they could (while we were in between court battles around Net Neutrality).

They don't look at the future ramifications of ISPs being able to block the next YouTube because Google paid them a bunch of money. Or the next Amazon. Or whomever else.

They don't look at the issues of the incumbents putting legal barriers into place to prevent real competition. See: Baltimore City's 2016 10 year deal with Comcast for an exclusive cable TV franchise, effectively barring Verizon from rolling out FiOS (which is in every county and suburb around Baltimore City) because of a lack of potential profit margin (they could roll out Internet, but won't do it without the option of rolling out TV as well).

The stance of the GOP members of Congress makes no sense. Their constituents want Net Neutrality. Their political opponents want Net Neutrality. Everybody wants Net Neutrality, except the telcos (who donate to everyone, though do spend marginally more on Republicans).

The only people making it a political issue are the f*ing politicians!

It's a partisan issue because Republicans in Congress and the FCC made it a partisan issue. As mentioned in previous articles on Ars and in this very comment thread, Net Neutrality has broad support amongst the public across both both parties.

Congresspeople are tasked with the job of representing the interests of their constituents. If the majority of their constituents support NN, they should be fighting for it. The GOP members who represent those constituents aren't doing their job.

Why on earth has this become a partisan issue in government??? And now that we're in an election year, the Democratic politicians seem bent on leveraging it as a partisan issue.

Sure it shouldn't be a partisan issue but the reality is that the leaders of the two political parties greatly differ on this. - The leaders of the Republicans, want to dismantle net neutrality. - The leaders of the Democrats are in favor of net neutrality. That is a basic fact.

In a democracy the voters will have a choice in November between electing those from the party that is against net neutrality or the party that supports it.

Edit; clarity

I'd take it a step further and say that the lobbyists writing the talking points for the Republicans want to dismantle net neutrality.

A few people seem to have misconstrued my intent in asking the original question. We all know that to the American people, this isn't a partisan issue. Most of the Republican politicians, if questioned on this, will parrot back the same talking points created by the ISP lobby regarding how putting ISPs under Title II is undemocratic, imposes too heavy a burden, and broke things. In other words, they and their aides haven't actually taken the time to investigate what the 2015 regulations did, and what repealing them does (not to mention Blackburn's bill).

My main issue as this point is that instead of being up in arms at the sheer level of ignorance being clung to by Republican politicians (for the most part), Democrats have seized on this issue because they see that the majority of US citizens get what's going on, and don't like what the FCC has done. This means that they now have a way to talk to Republican voters.

That's all good as far as it goes, but I'm starting to see Dem talking points aimed at alienating Republicans based on this issue, while at the same time asking for a Republican senator to turn coat and join the Democrats (instead of just asking them to support Net Neutrality).

So yeah; there's politics going on... but there's a whole lot of unneeded politicis going on too, that is more likely to make the situation worse instead of better.

Why on earth has this become a partisan issue in government??? And now that we're in an election year, the Democratic politicians seem bent on leveraging it as a partisan issue.

Sure it shouldn't be a partisan issue but the reality is that the leaders of the two political parties greatly differ on this. - The leaders of the Republicans, want to dismantle net neutrality. - The leaders of the Democrats are in favor of net neutrality. That is a basic fact.

In a democracy the voters will have a choice in November between electing those from the party that is against net neutrality or the party that supports it.

Edit; clarity

I'd take it a step further and say that the lobbyists writing the talking points for the Republicans want to dismantle net neutrality.

A few people seem to have misconstrued my intent in asking the original question. We all know that to the American people, this isn't a partisan issue. Most of the Republican politicians, if questioned on this, will parrot back the same talking points created by the ISP lobby regarding how putting ISPs under Title II is undemocratic, imposes too heavy a burden, and broke things. In other words, they and their aides haven't actually taken the time to investigate what the 2015 regulations did, and what repealing them does (not to mention Blackburn's bill).

My main issue as this point is that instead of being up in arms at the sheer level of ignorance being clung to by Republican politicians (for the most part), Democrats have seized on this issue because they see that the majority of US citizens get what's going on, and don't like what the FCC has done. This means that they now have a way to talk to Republican voters.

That's all good as far as it goes, but I'm starting to see Dem talking points aimed at alienating Republicans based on this issue, while at the same time asking for a Republican senator to turn coat and join the Democrats (instead of just asking them to support Net Neutrality).

So yeah; there's politics going on... but there's a whole lot of unneeded politicis going on too, that is more likely to make the situation worse instead of better.

Which brings us to the current political climate of the United States:

Everything said by members of the other party is wrong, and must be fought with every fiber of your being. Compromise is off the table.

American politics has devolved into tyranny of whomever happens to be in power. This is not even remotely close to how this is supposed to work.

Why on earth has this become a partisan issue in government??? And now that we're in an election year, the Democratic politicians seem bent on leveraging it as a partisan issue.

Sure it shouldn't be a partisan issue but the reality is that the leaders of the two political parties greatly differ on this. - The leaders of the Republicans, want to dismantle net neutrality. - The leaders of the Democrats are in favor of net neutrality. That is a basic fact.

In a democracy the voters will have a choice in November between electing those from the party that is against net neutrality or the party that supports it.

Edit; clarity

I'd take it a step further and say that the lobbyists writing the talking points for the Republicans want to dismantle net neutrality.

A few people seem to have misconstrued my intent in asking the original question. We all know that to the American people, this isn't a partisan issue. Most of the Republican politicians, if questioned on this, will parrot back the same talking points created by the ISP lobby regarding how putting ISPs under Title II is undemocratic, imposes too heavy a burden, and broke things. In other words, they and their aides haven't actually taken the time to investigate what the 2015 regulations did, and what repealing them does (not to mention Blackburn's bill).

My main issue as this point is that instead of being up in arms at the sheer level of ignorance being clung to by Republican politicians (for the most part), Democrats have seized on this issue because they see that the majority of US citizens get what's going on, and don't like what the FCC has done. This means that they now have a way to talk to Republican voters.

That's all good as far as it goes, but I'm starting to see Dem talking points aimed at alienating Republicans based on this issue, while at the same time asking for a Republican senator to turn coat and join the Democrats (instead of just asking them to support Net Neutrality).

So yeah; there's politics going on... but there's a whole lot of unneeded politicis going on too, that is more likely to make the situation worse instead of better.

No debate ever has perfect/complete knowledge. And one thing encouraging things to be far away from an in depth debate is the USA political process which fits issues into simple sound bites. But that's the reality of the US system.

A person can speculate on the origins of the anti-net nutrality position of Republican politicians.But in terms of the debate it comes down to the Republican leaders taking that position. They have owned it. And that has consequences in the voting booth in November, when people will have a clear choice on this issue.

Should Republican Senators be encouraged to change their position or not? Isn't that type of influencing part of what US politics has been about since the beginning?

Thank you for contacting me with your thoughts on net neutrality and the recent vote to repeal it. I value your input on this important issue, and I appreciate the opportunity to respond.

In 2015, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted to reclassify high-speed broadband internet service as a public utility under Title II of the Telecommunications Act. During the comment period for this rule, more than 4 million Americans voiced their support for net neutrality and open internet protections. This reclassification allowed for the creation of clearer rules banning paid prioritization of content and services across all internet platforms. This includes mobile broadband, which accounts for 63 percent of all broadband usage. In short, the net neutrality rule was a commitment to give every American equal access to a free and open internet.

I have been a longtime advocate for net neutrality. That is why I am furious that President Trump's hand-picked FCC chairman, Ajit Pai, and the Republican majority on the FCC voted to overturn net neutrality, striking a huge blow against Americans' right to a free and open internet. With this decision, internet service providers (ISPs) will now have the power to dictate the connection speed for certain websites, give favored companies access to paid fast lanes, and broker deals to prioritize their own services and content over those of their competitors. By giving ISPs the power to pick winners and losers, the FCC is stifling online competition and innovation, which are critical to our ability to compete in the global economy.

The internet is not a luxury. It is an essential part of modern life, just like water, electricity, gas, sewage, and transportation. Net neutrality makes it possible for disconnected communities to plug back into our economy, for workers to find job training and career opportunities, and for local businesses to access government contracts. The FCC's decision to repeal net neutrality is yet another example of the Republican Party siding with multinational corporations and big business over the interests of the American people. Shame on them for going against the will of the people with such wanton disregard for how this policy will impact their lives.

Thankfully, there is already legislation in Congress to try and prevent the repeal of net neutrality from taking place. I am proud to be a cosponsor of H.R. 4585, the Save Net Neutrality Act of 2017. This bill would prohibit the FCC from using the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) that makes it possible for FCC to eliminate net neutrality. By adding this restriction on the FCC, H.R. 4585 will allow the internet to remain free and open. This bill has been referred to the House Energy and Commerce Committee where it awaits further action.

The internet is an indispensable part of American life, and we must do better to balance users' need for personal freedom, privacy, and access to free-flowing information. Rest assured I will continue to closely monitor changes to net neutrality, any new rules and regulations coming from the FCC, and pending legislation to ensure that Ohioans' rights are protected. Thank you again for your correspondence.

Why on earth has this become a partisan issue in government??? And now that we're in an election year, the Democratic politicians seem bent on leveraging it as a partisan issue.

You can lose your marbles all you want about Democrats but they are on the right side of history and as usual republicans are on the wrong side.

Hey, remember when Southern democrats supported slavery? Remember when the republican party was leading the Union against slavery? The republican party is sometimes referred to as "The party of Lincoln" (i.e. Abraham Lincoln) as a result.

As someone that actually cares a lot about history, you're really only looking at the last 20 or so years, and that's not really fair.